French E-Commerce Growing in Confidence

A rising population of stores, double-digit growth in revenue and enhanced cross-border selling opportunities were the salient points derived from a fresh study into France’s e-commerce industry.

FEVAD, the country’s association of e-commerce, has revealed a number of findings from 2013 which suggest France’s €51.5 billion online shopping market could be set to elevate itself above those within Europe.

PerformanceIN reported last month on FEVAD’s revealing of widespread growth for France’s online businesses. The new research provides a much more detailed picture of the situation at hand - taking a look at results over the last 12 months, as opposed to the first three of 2014.

New sellers serve new shoppers

Researchers from FEVAD claim that nearly six in ten French people, or 33.8 million around the country, now use the internet to purchase products and services. Their requests are being met by 138,000 e-commerce websites, a crowd that grew by 17% over the course of 2013.

Increases in customers and businesses translated to a 13.5% lift in online revenue last year as the number of transactions grew 17.5%.

Unfortunately this did hint at a slight decrease in the average basket value, which dropped 3.5% year on year to hit €84.50. Six years ago, the average transaction value was at an all-time high of €92, but has been in decline ever since.

Retailers have been forced to combat this slump by ensuring their order numbers continue to grow. Online marketplaces were found to be an effective way of generating extra revenue, as the overall value of sales through the likes of eBay and Amazon as well as French-based sites like Le Bon Coin grew by 50% during 2013.

Eager for expansion

FEVAD also states that 57% of French e-commerce retailers sell outside of their country, possibly due to their ties with international marketplaces such as Amazon. But this may be seen as a way of breaking out of the monopoly that currently dictates the success of their industry.

It is believed that two-thirds of the 138,000 online retailers around France generate less than €30,000 per year. A mere 0.5% of stores sell over €10 million worth of products per annum and therefore account for 67% of all online sales across the country.

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Richard Towey

Richard is a former head of content at PerformanceIN. After many years spent covering developments from the automotive, sports, travel and finance sectors, he eventually turned his full attention to reporting on stories from the fast-evolving world of digital marketing.